Why Drug Makers Are Targeting Your Pet

Some very powerful people have become extremely interested in your cat or dog.

And not in a good way …

A few years ago, I had the privilege of speaking to Dr John Virapen. Dr Virapen worked more than 35 years in the pharmaceutical industry and was general manager for one of the major players, Eli Lilly & Company.

Dr Virapen shared some alarming information with me.

And it’s something that every pet owner needs to consider:

“There are numerous opportunities for pharmaceutical companies to corrupt the marketing of animal medicine because nobody really checks them. These people make a lot of money because nobody questions them and the animals get the short end of the stick. Vets can do whatever they want without fear of malpractice suits because dogs are property and their value is insufficient to be much of a threat.”

While I knew this was a very dangerous problem I didn’t realize was how strong a hold the pharmaceutical companies have on vets – and why animal pharmaceuticals have become so important to the major pharmaceutical companies.

“On the main floor of the convention, hundreds of veterinarians and technicians stood in a line that stretched to the far wall to enjoy a free lunch and hear from a world-class researcher on fleas. But he was not exactly impartial player.

“The lunch began with a warm-up speech by a representative from Merck Animal Health, based in Summit, N.J., who welcomed the crowd and reminded them to stop by the company’s booth, play a multiple-choice game and get a free book on animal parasites.

“We give this to you free, a $65 value, just for coming by and playing the game,” she said. One out of four people would win a second book, she added.

“Then the featured speaker took the stage, Dr. Michael Dryden, a professor of veterinary parasitology at Kansas State University.

“His talk was called “Get your ACT together with flea control.” The title was a play on the name Activyl, a drug Merck recently launched to prevent fleas.

“Thanks all for coming,” he said, looking at the packed room. “I’m always amazed at what a free lunch does.”

“Dryden, whose university profile says he is “considered one of the world’s foremost experts on fleas and ticks” and who has lectured in 22 countries, got down to business.

“Dryden talked for more than a half-hour on how fleas nest and lay eggs in a pet’s fur.

“What Dryden didn’t say was that Merck had paid him $56,705 to conduct research on the effectiveness of Activyl. Or that his research at Kansas State has received more than $5 million in industry funding in recent years.

“Dryden did not respond to several phone messages and emails seeking comment about whether he feels beholden to industry and what he does to avoid conflicts of interest.

“A Merck spokeswoman, Pamela Eisele, declined to say how much the company had paid Dryden or other veterinarians in recent years for research, speaking or consulting.

“We do not maintain a public database of all recipients, primarily to protect the confidentiality of our research efforts,” she wrote in an email.

“Such events took place throughout the three-day convention. Some veterinarians did disclose receiving payments for their effort. One told The Star he was paid $2,000 and airfare to speak.”

So pharmaceutical companies can legally refuse to talk about payments to vets.

Which is notable, because this would be illegal in human medicine.

“Federal law now requires all drug companies and medical-device makers covered by federal health care programs to publish databases of all payments to physicians of more than $10” says Russell.

This means that if a human doctor were to accept a toaster or even a $10 Starbucks gift card, the information would have to be made public. But in veterinary medicine, we have no idea whether vets are accepting gifts or payouts from the drug makers. Neither the vets nor the pharmaceutical companies are required to report it.

And it’s really important to know if your vet is being completely objective about the meds he prescribes for your pet because:

Drugs Provide 30% Of A Typical Vet’s Revenue

Did you know that you don’t have to purchase your pet’s meds at your vet clinic?

Most people don’t.

Which is ironic because medical doctors aren’t allowed to profit from drug sales at all. You have to go to the pharmacy for your drugs and that’s good business … you wouldn’t want to be guessing whether you really need that drug or whether your doctor needs the money.

But in veterinary medicine, about 58% of all pet medicine sales are out of veterinary clinics, according to Packaged Facts.

And according to Veterinary Practice News, these drug sales account for almost 30% of vets’ revenues.

“The job of a veterinarian can be tough and dirty – and not a path to riches,” says Russell. “The median pay of a veterinarian was $84,460 in 2012 – less than half as much as the median pay for physicians, $187,200, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.”

So according to Russell, veterinary consultants speak openly about the need to more than double the price of drugs to turn a healthy profit.

“To operate a pharmacy as an efficient profit center, veterinarians need to be able to manage inventory and price products appropriately,” Dr Lowell Ackerman, a veterinarian who taught at Tufts University, wrote in a 2011 article widely distributed in the industry. In the article, he wrote it’s “not unusual” for veterinary clinics to mark up products by 200 percent.

At the Pacific Veterinary conference in Anaheim, Calif., in 2007, accountant Fritz Wood advised veterinarians that keeping medicine priced high was a smart way to make a clinic more profitable.

Why Are Drug Makers Focusing On Pets?

Pharmaceutical companies are investing billions of dollars into pet medicines.

And why wouldn’t they? It’s faster and easier (and ultimately cheaper) for pet medicines to be approved by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA).

“But that abbreviated review comes with a cost,” says Russell.” There is a greater risk of pet drugs entering the market with unforeseen side effects.”

“I recruited the General Manager of animal product in Scandinavia and we had frequent conversations.,” says Virapen. “He warned me of the many issues with the animal products. For example, while the company was still trying to get approval for human growth hormone (HGH) for animals, they were already injecting it into pigs and cows. They didn’t care that the HGH was contaminated: they were mostly waste from the human market although humans would be consuming these animals in the end.”

Morever, Virapen says that pet medicines can be a dumping ground for expired human medicines.

“The pharmaceutical companies use vaccinations and drugs they can’t dispense for humans on dogs. This includes expired lots as well as products not approved for human use.”

Seeding And The Media

The marketing efforts of the pharmaceutical companies don’t end with vets. They also work closely with the media.

This is called “seeding.”

“Marketing strategies are planned years ahead,” says Virapen. “If a new product is on the way, the pharmaceutical companies will do the market research first and based on that, lay down strategies in terms of time and method. This is normally done with a five year projection before launch.

“Their ploys include personal letters to vets and doctors with large practices, targeting specific sections of medicine and gathering information on how many animals can be targeted, who owns them (and they get information from licenses, so the government is in on it).”

Marketing is the single highest cost for pharmaceutical companies, not research. – Dr John Virapen

Anatomy Of An Epidemic

Vaccines, while just a portion of pharmaceutical sales, amounted to $34 billion in sales in 2012 alone.

In 2011, canine influenza and the need for vaccination were heavily covered in the media. At the center of most of the media articles warning pet owners of canine influenza outbreaks was Dr Cynthia Crawford.

Dr Crawford is a veterinarian at the University of Florida (UF) who led the research team that first identified the canine influenza virus in 2004.

Crawford, along with colleagues at UF, Cornell University and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), share intellectual rights to the canine influenza virus.

The pharmaceutical company Merck then licensed the right to use the canine influenza virus to make a vaccine.

Crawford maintains that she and the others do not receive compensation from vaccine sales but since it’s a pet vaccine, she isn’t required to reveal whether she does.

Merck states that it markets the vaccine through “education of boarding facility operators, kennels, pet owners and veterinarians about the disease state and about steps they can take to encourage prevention.”

The VIN reports “some veterinarians suspect that vigorous marketing of canine influenza vaccine plays a part in confusing perceptions of disease prevalence.”

When Merck was approached about overzealous marketing, a company media relations official had no comment.

Practice manager of A-Animal Clinic in Fort Worth Texas, Newley Spikes reported to VIN that vaccine vendors “pounded us with the information. We’re one of the largest boarding facilities (in the area); we hold 150 dogs. They’ve been after us for about 24 months or so that we need to get on board with CIV. They continue to bring it to our attention if there are cases anywhere.”

Spikes said he doesn’t consider Merck’s vigorous marketing inappropriate. He said the clinic charges $19.85 for the first shot and the same for the booster.

“Our clientele has been nothing but receptive,” he reported.

After the media frenzy, just how bad was the influenza outbreak of 2011?

Dr Christian Leutenegger, head of molecular diagnostics for Idexx, reported just eight cases in California, ten in New York City and environs and ten in Texas.

Vet Spending Is Up

In 2012, US pet owners spend $14.37 billion on veterinary care – up 5 percent over 2012. And the American Pet Products Association (APPA) estimates that spending will go up another 6 percent in 2014 for a total of $15.25 billion.

Perhaps declining vet visits are making vets look for more ways to keep their clinics profitable. And pharmaceutical sales may be just what the doctor ordered.

“Clients have no idea how much medicine should cost, so a fee increase will almost never be noticed,” says accountant Fritz Wood.

And vets seem to be motivated enough by sales of pet medicines to fight a recent move to make pet meds available online and in big box stores.

“In 2012, dozens of veterinarians threatened to boycott a conference in Orlando, Fla., organized by the North American Veterinary Conference when they learned that a discount retailer, PetMeds, would be a sponsor and exhibitor,” says Russell. “Most human drugs are purchased at pharmacies, but the nation’s 90,000 veterinarians sell most of the nation’s pet medicines. And they make money on every prescription they dispense.”

Dana Scott is the Founder and CEO of Dogs Naturally Magazine. She also breeds award winning Labrador Retrievers under the Fallriver prefix. Dana has been a raw feeding, natural rearing breeder since the 90's and is a sought after speaker and outspoken advocate for natural health care for dogs and people. Dana works tirelessly to educate pet owners so they can influence veterinary medicine and change current vaccine, food and preventive health practices. Visit Dana's Labradors at Fallriver Labs

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